Pages

Saturday

Top 10 Most Livable Cities

Toronto City Hall - Old Building

Very recently, The Economist released the most livable cities in the world. Melbourne in Australia got the top spot. Canada commanded three of the top 10 spots; Vancouver in British Columbia in Canada claimed the 3rd, Toronto 4th, and Calgary 5th, tied with Adelaide in Australia.

While it is true that no place is perfect, I am proud that I lived in Toronto half of my life and will be living for the rest of it.

Seven of the top 10 cities were in
Canada and Australia, a strong reflection of what the newsmagazine
considers livable: a mid-sized city that’s not congested, with a low
murder rate, good transit and health care and decent recreation.

Melbourne, Australia claimed the top
spot for the second year in a row, capitalizing on black marks against
Vancouver for increased congestion.

Vancouver had put shovels in the
ground to fix its traffic and transit woes, the magazine said, but the
long-term gain comes with short-term disruption.

Vancouver and Toronto, which ranked
fourth, outscored the other top 10 cities in stability and culture and
environment but fell down in comparison on infrastructure (roads,
transit, international links, housing and telecommunications).

All 10 of the most livable cities
were closely ranked: the top four each collected 97 points out of 100
and even Auckland, New Zealand, in the 10th spot, had 95.7 points.

In fact, no city on the list for the top 65 locales has budged in the last six months, The Economist said.

Canada commanded three of the top 10
spots — Calgary tied with Adelaide, Australia, for 5th — and Sydney and
Perth brought Australia’s total to four.

“Murder rates in Melbourne, Vienna
(the Number 2 city) and Vancouver, were respectively 2.7, 1.1 and 2.5
per 100,000 people in 2010-11, compared with the American average of
4.8,” the magazine said.

The ranking, originally designed to
determine if business executives needed hardship pay when working
abroad, rates 140 cities considered business centres for their
stability, health care, culture and environment, education, and
infrastructure. “American cities tend not to do as
well as their Australian and Canadian counterparts because poor scores
for crime and congestion negate their decent marks for culture,” the
magazine said.

“New York, London, Paris and Tokyo
are all prestigious hubs with a wealth of recreational activity but all
suffer from higher levels of crime, congestion and public transport
problems.”

The highest U.S. score went to Honolulu at 26th.

London and Manchester fell to 51st
and 55th because of last summer’s riots, the magazine said. Dhaka stuck
in last place because of poor health care and infrastructure.

If you liked what you read, we encourage you to leave a comment. We welcome all comments that are useful to all members and followers and will benefit the readers. Remember, you are a traveller and this is your blog.

Anonymous commenters and/or comments with commercial links will not be published.